*Note: Just in case you’ve found this via Google result/witchcraft/etc., this is a test article for a new feature and none of the information contained herein is accurate.
This week we have four brand new covers from Tobias S. Buckell, H. A. Clarke, Ray Nayler, and Joma West!
This week’s both feature a kingdom where “thou shalt not suffer a librarian to live” is a common refrain, the finale of a witchfinding thriller trilogy, a not-so-distant future where the digitized personality of a scientist is resurrected in order to teach also-resurrected mammoths how to survive, and an intimate novel about a person who is forced to choose between two timelines and the families they’ve made in both.
You’ll see these books on shelves in early 2024, but you can check out their covers right now!
A Stranger in the Citadel by Tobias S. Buckell
From the powerful storyteller Tobias Buckell (Crystal Rain, The Tangled Lands), a complex novel of humanity’s passion for the written word. At the revolutionary crossroads of magic, betrayal, and long-forgotten truths, a naïve, compassionate royal and a determined, hunted librarian discover a dangerous world of mortal and ancient menaces.
Lilith has heard an oblique warning all of her life: “Thou shall not suffer a librarian to live.”
The life of the youngest musketress of Ninetha has been one of hard training. But Lilith’s days have also contained many pleasures, the royal privileges of her family’s guardianship of the Cornucopia, a mystical source of limitless bounty. Lilith has never seen a book, and she never expects to encounter one within in the safety of the citadel.
When Ishmael, an outcast librarian, shows up outside the Afriq Gate, Lilith saves him from immediate execution by her father’s second-in-command, the zealot Kira. As Lilith’s curiosity draws her to the Ishmael, she lets slip her family’s most dangerous secret to Kira, sparking a deadly rebellion and an unexpected journey full of stunning revelations.
Called “violent, poetic and compulsively readable” by Maclean’s, science fiction author Tobias S. Buckell is a New York Times bestselling writer and World Fantasy Award winner. He was born in the Caribbean, grew up in Grenada, and spent time in the British and US Virgin Islands. His Xenowealth series begins with Crystal Rain. Along with other standalone novels and his almost one hundred stories, Buckell’s works have been translated into twenty different languages. He has been nominated for the Hugo and Nebula Awards, and the Astounding Award for Best New Science Fiction Author. Buckell currently lives in Bluffton, Ohio with his wife and two daughters, where he teaches Creative Writing at Bluffton University. He’s also an instructor at the Stonecoast MFA in Creative Writing program.
The Feast Makers by H. A. Clarke
After restoring their powers, Sideways just wants to get on with senior year. But the covens have convened for the trial of Madeline Kline. When this stubborn, independent witch begs the Scapegracers to save her from a cruel and unusual punishment, Sideways knows they have to get involved. It’s the right thing to do, even if Madeline did steal their soul and wear it for a time. Right?
Making an example out of Madeline seems, strangely, just as important to the most powerful covens as divvying up the Scapegracers amongst themselves. Sideways, Jing, Daisy, and Yates are reluctant to abandon what they’ve built together, but as the college acceptances (and rejections) roll in, the offer of a magical family beyond Sycamore Gorge becomes increasingly tempting.
Unfortunately, choosing a new coven will have to wait: witchfinders are gathering in town, and some of these visitors make the Chantrys seem tame in comparison. Every witch—Scapegracer or not—is about to be in grave danger.
And on top of all that, Sideways thinks they just might be in love.
In H. A. Clarke’s signature raw and explosive style, The Feast Makers brings the indie-bestselling Scapegracers trilogy to a dynamic end as Sideways, Jing, Daisy, Yates, and Shiloh struggle with college acceptances, queer romance, and the meaning of justice in an ever-challenging world.
“The Feast Makers is a decadent work of absolutely feral genius. Reading it made me grow extra teeth. This one cements H.A. Clarke as a put-everything-down, cancel-plans must-read for me.”– Hugo Award-winning and bestselling author, Sarah Gailey
August Clarke is here and queer, etc. They have been published in PRISM international, Portland Review, and Eidolon. They were a 2019 Lambda Literary Fellow in Young Adult Fiction and a Pushcart nominee. They researched queerness, labor, and monstrosity at the University of Chicago. The Feast Makers is the third book in their indie-bestselling series, The Scapegracers, where they write as H. A. Clarke.
The Tusks of Extinction by Ray Nayler
When you bring back a long-extinct species, there’s more to success than the DNA.
Moscow has resurrected the mammoth, but someone must teach them how to be mammoths, or they are doomed to die out, again.
The late Dr. Damira Khismatullina, the world’s foremost expert in elephant behavior, is called in to help. While she was murdered a year ago, her digitized consciousness is uploaded into the brain of a mammoth.
Can she help the magnificent creatures fend off poachers long enough for their species to take hold?
And will she ever discover the real reason they were brought back?
Ray Nayler is the author of the critically acclaimed novel The Mountain in the Sea, published in the US by MCDxFSG. The Mountain in the Sea is a finalist for the Nebula Award and for the LA Times Book Awards’ Ray Bradbury Award for Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Speculative Fiction.
Twice Lived by Joma West
Two Worlds. Two Minds. One Life.
There are two Earths. Perfectly ordinary and existing in parallel. There are no doorways between them, no way to cross from one world to another. Unless you’re a shifter.
Canna and Lily are the same person but they refuse to admit it. Their split psyche has forced them to shift randomly between worlds—between lives and between families—for far longer than they should. But one mind can’t bear this much life. It’ll break under the weight of it all. Soon they’ll experience their final shift and settle at last in one world, but how can they prepare both families for the eventuality of them disappearing forever?
Joma West is a third culture writer whose work straddles both fantasy and science fiction. Growing up bouncing between countries has given her work a certain displaced flavor and you can see many African and Asian influences in her writing. Joma’s novella, Wild, won the 2016 MMU novella award and her 2022 debut novel, Face, was met with acclaim. She lives in Glasgow.
Check out new book covers every week here on Tor.com.
